


Tyger Tyger, Burning Bright

by tiger_moran



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes (Downey films), Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Affection, Anal Sex, Anger, Don't copy to another site, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Kissing, Love, M/M, Murder, Referenced Child Abduction, Referenced violence, Rough Sex, referenced child death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-24
Updated: 2020-04-24
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:55:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23812666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiger_moran/pseuds/tiger_moran
Summary: Not everyone who comes to the Professor for assistance desires advice about how to successfully perform a burglary or how to break someone out of prison or arrange some other obviously highly illegal plot. Sometimes people come to him because they need help, desperately, and help of a kind that they feel the law cannot provide.Mr Cooper was one such client.(Written for the prompt: "In Gambling Man, Moriarty observed the feral nature Moran carries. I'd love to see this taken to the extreme if this sparks anything!" Please read the notes first if you want a better idea about where this prompt took me.)
Relationships: Sebastian Moran/James Moriarty
Comments: 10
Kudos: 32





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is probably considerably darker than most of the other Moriarty/Moran fics I've written. However, anything which involves harm to children is not done by Moran or Moriarty and while there is rough sex, there is no real violence between the two of them. I've used the archive warning 'graphic depictions of violence' just to be safe but the abuse and murder of children by another character is referenced several times but is mostly referring to events prior to the story and is not shown in any detail, and the actual violence in this fic takes place towards another adult character but is also not covered in graphic detail.

Not everyone who comes to the Professor for assistance desires advice about how to successfully perform a burglary or how to break someone out of prison or arrange some other obviously highly illegal plot. Sometimes people come to him because they need help, desperately, and help of a kind that they feel the law cannot provide.

Mr Cooper was one such client.

He cried during his consultation with Moriarty, breaking off into sobs almost immediately upon trying to explain his reason for being there. This caused the Professor to sit there looking embarrassed and a little exasperated and Moran to stand staring at his own shoes, pretending he hadn't noticed this lapse, both of them waiting for the man's loss of composure to pass so that he could explain himself.

“My son... they have my son,” he had got out finally, wringing his now somewhat damp handkerchief between his hands.

“Who's 'they'?” Moran asked, before Moriarty could.

Cooper's red-rimmed eyes fixed on the Colonel's face. “I have no idea, alas, but someone has taken him.”

“No ransom demand?” Moriarty queried.

“None sir.”

No fool, Cooper, really, for all that he stammered and sniffed and sobbed his way through his story of how his eldest son had vanished shortly after a trivial argument between them. He knew that the official police would not be terribly interested in a missing ten year old boy from a hard-working but dirt poor family, despite it being completely out of character for the child to vanish like that, argument or no argument. Also he is clearly astute enough to grasp that a man such as the Professor may have very useful knowledge and connections that Scotland Yard or even that so-called consulting detective Sherlock Holmes do not. Moreover, he knew that the kind of justice that the Professor and his associates can mete out is very different to that dealt out by the British courts.

“Will you help me, please, sir?” he had asked at last, tremulously, looking from Moriarty to Moran and back again, intimidated by both of them for different reasons. The Professor is austere and stern when faced like this, not cruel, not mocking, but remote and unreadable. Up until the very last moment it is impossible for most to judge how he will decide. Cooper might easily have believed that the Professor would turn him down without experiencing a single mote of remorse or regret over such an action. The Colonel is intimidating in a different manner though. Attired perfectly respectfully, still there is something fierce in his countenance that reminds many men of a wild animal. His pale blue eyes seem to scrutinise men as if they are prey, watching largely in silence.

“Yes, I will,” Moriarty had said at last, brushing aside Cooper's fulsome thanks as if casting aside a speck of dust.

“What about... payment?” the man had asked hesitantly shortly after. “Whatever I have is yours, sir, if you can restore my boy to me unharmed, but I'm afraid, sir, I have little.”

“Payment for my services does not always have to be made in money,” Moriarty had replied. “Sometimes it can be made in _favours_ instead.”

Cooper looked at him, somewhat perplexed by this, not entirely understanding what he could possibly ever do to repay the Professor should this man return his son to him, but both too desperate and too afraid of losing his main chance at getting the boy back alive to question this.

“Go home and wait to hear from me,” Moriarty instructed, and thus effectively dismissed Cooper from his presence. “What do you think?” he had asked Moran, when Cooper had left the house.

“I think... I am reminded of those other boys who 'ave gone missin'.” Moran has decency and sense enough not to say this in front of Cooper, knowing that it would worry the man too much, but it occurred to him immediately that Cooper began to explain the situation.

“Sometimes boys run away,” Moriarty had pointed out, playing the voice of reason, but not necessarily believing it to be relevant here.

Moran shook his head slowly. “Boys already livin' on the streets anyway? Where they gonna run to?”

Street children, those without families or with families too violent and abusive to bear staying with. The invisible children that so many will walk past without thought, no longer young enough to exert much pity from passers by, but still children. Moran notices them though; he has some of them running errands for him, being his eyes and ears in shadowy and inaccessible places. Some of them even trust him enough by now to confide in him, and they have told him, of the boys who have disappeared, the children whom polite society does not care about and will never miss.

What does not fit with those in this case though is that here then is a boy, young Master Tom Cooper, who still has a doting father, and a loving though invalid mother at home, both of them missing him dreadfully. Either it is coincidence, and someone else, likely someone with a particular grievance against the Cooper family, has snatched their son, or whoever is responsible for the disappearance of those other boys has made a second mistake in thinking the boy to be without family – their first mistake being, of course, to assume that simply because polite society does not give a damn about those other boys, that does not mean that nobody does.

Moran does. Even Moriarty, in his own odd way, is not unsympathetic. He is not good around young children and would never desire a child of his own, but in his opinion those who mistreat and harm children are cowards and bullies and to be utterly despised. He himself appreciates criminality as an art form, but there is a world of difference between some elegant and complex scheme to, say, steal a priceless painting from under the nose of a museum's night security guard, and harming a child. Nor is the Professor oblivious to the possible reasons why someone may abduct children. Money is the obvious motive of course but then Cooper is hardly what could be called wealthy and monetary gain is certainly not the motivation in the cases of those other poor boys; nobody will ever pay a ransom for any of those children. It must surely be something else then, something that makes Moran shiver to contemplate it.

“You have been on the trail of those boys already, I believe?” Moriarty had asked then, and Moran nodded.

“Yes sir, in between my duties for you.”

“Then focus all of your attention on that at present. I want the Cooper boy found.”

“Why, sir, if I may ask?” Moran had queried. Because he knows that the Professor is not utterly heartless, but he cannot see what a man such as Cooper can ever do to repay Moriarty for returning his son to him.

“Because it amuses me to pursue this; because one can never have too many favours owed; because whoever is taking these children has encroached on _my_ territory; because I know you, Sebastian, and I know that you will not let this go or be able to properly focus on your other work if I do not permit you to resolve this matter.” Moriarty waved a hand. “Many reasons.”

“Because you care?” Moran had asked, meeting the Professor's gaze resolutely.

Moriarty had smiled; it was his only answer, but it was enough.

“And the others?” Moran said. He did not truly want to ask the question, afraid of the answer, but he felt that one of them must voice it.

Moriarty, his elbows resting on his desk, fingers steepled together before his face had said, “Yes find them also, if they _can_ be found.” Noting how Moran winced slightly at this response, as if pained. Of course he knows too that those boys may well be dead, but it stings to be confronted with this thought out loud.

“And if I find those responsible?” Moran enquired, leaning against the desk.

“Then of course you shall deal with them as you see fit,” Moriarty had replied.

-

And now here they are, the Professor, somewhat unusually, accompanying him, primarily due to the fact that Moriarty is far more skilled than Moran at picking locks. Moran can manage it perfectly well, when he tries, but it is one of those tasks which he finds hard to apply his mind to.

“I could just kick the door down,” he says, watching Moriarty kneeling to expertly manipulate the lock picks. Behind him wait two more men.

“Too obvious, my dear Moran.” Moriarty continues to gently, almost lovingly, probe inside the lock with the picks.

Moran grins. “Quicker though.” He paces restlessly, eager to get inside the building. All of his searching, his tracking, his questioning of other boys - friends of some of the missing and the only possible witnesses to who abducted them - have led them here.

Neither the Professor nor the Colonel is surprised that it is the abode of a lord. For once the look on Moran's face when he learned of this fact was indecipherable even to Moriarty, who can usually read Moran rather well. But given Moran's general opinions of lords, the Professor can probably guess with some accuracy at the emotions Moran was experiencing.

In the shadows nearby two carriages wait, one of them ready to transport Tom Cooper home, if he can be located. Neither of them voices the thought aloud that at best they may be about to send a corpse back in that carriage. Even the Professor finds the notion too distasteful to speak of and, besides, if Tom is dead then Moriarty has failed, and the thought is intolerable. It is another reason why he chose to accompany Moran, to be in there at the last, not because he doesn't trust Moran – he does, of course he does – but because the matter has become a very personal one to him. Moriarty _does not_ fail and cannot fail now.

The door clicks open. The Professor stands and gestures to Moran. “After you.”

Moran glances at him, nods, walks forward. Moriarty wonders as Moran passes him why the Colonel's hand is shaking so.

-

“Where are the other boys, Lord Abbott?” the Professor asks calmly.

Lord Abbott looks at him across the dinner table, oddly serene, the candlelight making strange shadows play across his gaunt face. To his right sits Tom Cooper – scared, with a glassiness in his eyes that suggests he has been drugged at least enough to keep him from trying to run, but alive. There are no servants, no staff, not so much as a horse or a dog. A carriage must have brought the pair here but it seems it is kept elsewhere. No doubt, the Professor thinks, everyone else is considered unworthy of being present for the grand finale of the evening. This house is so very isolated, which has previously been a blessing for Lord Abbott. Tonight however it may prove to be a curse.

“Gone,” the man replies, smiling somewhat beatifically. He still seems wholly unsurprised by the Professor and his entourage barging their way in in the middle of supper, even though he must be somewhat discomfited at least that the locks he had on the doors were apparently easily breached.

“Gone?” Moriarty queries.

“Gone,” Abbott repeats, still smiling as he meets the Professor's gaze, and something passes between them, from brown eyes to blue-grey, and Moriarty understands, even before Abbot says, “Truly they are angels now, all of them.”

“Hold!” Moriarty barks at Moran, whose anger is barely contained. Now, _now_ Moriarty understands the shake of the Colonel's hand which perplexed him so before - not nervousness, but rage. Moran's teeth are clenched as if to bite it back, but he won't last much longer before he explodes.

The Professor glances out of the tall windows, where a gap in the curtains shows the beginnings of the extensive gardens of the house. “Porter,” he says to the man behind him, though without turning around. “Please take the boy outside to the carriage.”

“Yes sir.” Porter gives him a smart salute and walks over to the boy, taking his hand to lead him from his chair. The child, cowed and drugged up, stumbles and almost falls to his knees, at which point Porter decides it is best simply to pick the boy up and carry him out. For a short fellow he is surprisingly strong and easily hoists the child over his shoulder.

“But you can't-” Abbott begins to protest, trying to rise from his seat, but from behind him Moran clamps a hand down on his shoulder, slamming him back into his seat.

“Sit the fuck down and shut the fuck up!” he snarls through his teeth. Only the presence in the room of the boy has truly kept his fury in check so far. As Porter carries Tom out though, Moran is rapidly shedding his veneer of respectability and calm. He lifts one booted foot and kicks the chair, shoving it so hard it skates several inches across the floor even with Abbott still seated upon it. “What the _fuck_ did you do to them?”

“Beautiful things,” Abbott says, looking up at Moran who towers over him, blue eyes ablaze. “Nothing a barbarian such as yourself could understand.” The look he gives to Moran would be absolutely withering, but against a man who has faced down man-eating tigers, it is impossible to intimidate him in such a manner.

Moran laughs, sharply and without an ounce of real amusement in it. The insult seems so strange though, he cannot help himself. “Barbarian, huh?” He leans forward, gripping Abbott's shirt front tightly in his fist. “Listen, you fucking-”

“Moran!” Moriarty says sharply, and for now it still manages to pierce through Moran's aura of fury, and he releases his hold, steps back. “Wait,” Moriarty instructs.

“Right sir.” But the look Moran gives the Professor clearly shows that his obedience, on this night, is not without limit. He will obey Moriarty only so far, before he rips this man before him to pieces.

“You believe it is art, do you not?” Moriarty enquires, moving to stand before Abbott. “Some great work, your magnum opus, perhaps?”

“Yes, yes!” Abbott looks at the Professor, delighted by this seeming show of understanding. “A most magnificent piece of art, the transformation of the human body from the mundane to the divine.”

“And all real and great art necessitates suffering, does it not?” Moriarty asks. He has seen some of the artwork on the walls in this grand house already, pictures of flayed and dissected bodies, exquisitely illustrated medical diagrams showing the innermost recesses of the human body, along with the wired skeletons, the skulls in glass cases, the medical specimens in jars of preservative.

“There can be no transmutation, no transformation, without suffering,” Abbott says solemnly, nodding. “There were moments when... it pained me, the things I had to do – even I am not immune always to the sounds made by animals such as those – but I pressed on, because I must.”

“How noble of you,” Moran sneers.

“Yes, it was,” Abbott says. “You mock me, sir, but you fail to understand, about true art.”

Moriarty looks into the man's aristocratic face and wonders, is this man utterly insane? With all those generations of inbreeding amongst the higher echelons of society, it is unsurprising that many are somewhat lacking mentally. But the face that looks back at him is not that of a man who has no grasp at all of what is right and wrong; it is a face that is chillingly sane, the face of a man then who thinks simply that he is himself far beyond such things, much like the Professor himself. But as a result he has plumbed depths which even the largely amoral Moriarty will shy away from.

“Why do you care about a few street children?” Abbott sneers. “Nobody cares about them – wild creatures living short pointless meaningless lives full of misery anyway, or growing up into drunkards and wife-beaters. What possible loss to the world can there be in snuffing out a few of them? In transforming them into something beautiful?”

“Transformation through suffering and death?” Moriarty says.

Abbott looks at him, eyes shining. “Of course.”

“People care about 'em,” Moran growls, taking a step towards Abbott again.

“Oh really?” he says scathingly. “Vermin like that? Killing them is fundamentally no different to killing rats.”

Moran hits him so hard that both Abbott and the chair end up lying on the floor. Blood trickles from Abbott's nose almost at once and he looks up at Moran, shocked, as if unable to comprehend the fact that he himself should experience such pain.

“Wait!” Moriarty commands again, holding up a hand to signal to Moran before he hits Abbott again.

Moran looks at him and the look in his eyes now... it is not cold and utterly detached like Abbott, but heated and passionate, animalistic, and it says clearly that he is only the barest fraction of an inch away from ripping the man before him apart in the manner of a wild beast. “Why?” he asks, and laughs, and the sound is far more amused now, because the prospect of killing Abbott delights him.

Moriarty does not answer him directly however. It is to Abbott he addresses himself. “Dear me, Mr Abbott, how you have erred.”

“Erred?” Abbott looks up at him, blood running through his fingers as he tries to staunch its flow from his nose. He only looks hurt and angry now, no longer the haughty aristocrat who believed he had control over everything, like a god.

“In believing that you and I are alike. Yes, I understand the art of death and cruelty; the beauty that may be found in pain, in suffering, in death itself. But you, Mr Abbott...” Moriarty takes a slow step forward with each word, until he is standing directly above Abbott.

All the time Moran watches the Professor, coiled like a big cat about to pounce, but waiting, waiting for the right moment, grasping even in his rage that it is better to let the Professor speak, that his lover's words may be just as devastating as anything Moran can inflict upon Abbott.

Moriarty tilts his head slightly to regard the man better. “You are not an artist, Mr Abbott.” He stoops now, so that his head is directly before Abbott's. “You are simply... a common... little... murderer.” And as he rises he nods, almost imperceptibly, to Moran.

“How dare you?” Abbott splutters, through his own blood. He puts one bloodied palm to the ground, trying to push himself up. “How dare you? There is-”

His protest is cut off abruptly by Moran's foot this time, his words reduced to an incoherent grunt as most of the air is knocked out of his lungs. “The Professor's right,” Moran says, almost conversationally, as he slams his booted heel down on Abbott's hand, eliciting a strangled cry from him. “You ain't special. I've seen your kind before time and time again.” He grins, and Moriarty, watching him, thinks that is _exactly_ what a tiger would look like if tigers could smile. “And you made another error, _Lord_ Abbott,” he says, imbuing that title with so much contempt, “in thinking nobody cares.” Still smiling as his dangerous, deadly countenance fills Abbott's vision, as Moran grips him by the hair in a bloodied hand, pulling back his head. His face is perhaps an inch away from Abbott's, his tone is barely more than a whisper, but so magnificently fierce. “ _I_ care.”

Moriarty steps back, retreating to the other side of the room – not squeamish but not wishing either for his clothing to be splashed with bodily fluids – and he watches, and he thinks how beautiful his lover is, even in times like this. The Colonel's rage is so absolutely feral, and so terribly, ferociously human. The mistake that some people make, the Professor thinks, is trying to separate their humanity from their own animal impulses, when in truth they cannot be separated. Man is an animal himself and to try to deny or suppress that fact is, he suspects, to truly destroy one's own humanity. This may run contrary to what many might believe of the Professor; they may assume him to be a very ascetic individual, one who shuns the pleasures of the flesh, when in truth Moriarty only shuns the commonplace and the mundane. He enjoys very much indulging himself when it comes to good food and wine, high quality clothing, beautiful music. And excellent sex with Moran, as it turns out, which has been a most pleasing discovery.

He experimentally sniffs at the wine in Abbott's glass before taking a sip of it. A not unpleasant Bordeaux. That its colour reminds him a little of blood troubles him not at all. Idly he runs the tip of a leather-gloved finger around the glass's rim whilst he turns to watch Moran.

When it is over, the Colonel straightens up, tilts back his head, pushing his short hair back off his forehead.

“Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him,” Moriarty comments.

Moran turns to regard him, eyes burning bright in a face splashed with red, showing his teeth when he grins.

“Clean yourself up,” Moriarty commands. “I will not have the carriage soiled.”

“Yes sir.”

Moriarty places the wine glass back down on the table before turning to leave the room. “Bennett!” he calls to the other man who accompanied them, one who has a certain somewhat specialised talent.

“Yes Professor?” the shorter, swarthy man says.

“You've checked the rest of the house?”

“Yes sir. Found no-one else.”

“And the outbuildings?”

“All empty sir.”

“You may start making your preparations then. Once we have finished here, burn it.”

“Yes Professor.”

Moriarty exits the house, taking a deep breath of cold night air once outside. He is not a man who is easily spooked, but that place has such an oppressive sense within it. He is glad to be out of it.

The other carriage has gone, bearing Tom away to safety with a doctor in the Professor's pay who will discreetly examine the boy and ensure he is well before he is returned to his parents. Porter stands on the driveway in front of the remaining carriage and looks up at the house.

“Puts the wind up me, this place,” he says. “To think of what's gone on in there...”

“Best not to think about it,” Moriarty advises, and what he thinks of, as he waits for Moran, is the pattern the blood made on the floor around Abbott's body, the shape of the marks. If one was being fanciful, he muses, one might suggest the bloodstains looked rather like... the wings of an angel.


	2. Chapter 2

As the carriage moves off down the drive, the house burns, the conflagration consuming furniture, paintings, the drapes, the rugs, before beginning to eat away at the fabric of the building itself. And Abbott's remains, of course.

Moran has no interest at all in watching the place burn. Moriarty has wished to remain only long enough to be sure the fire is taking hold. Once sure of that, he has bade their driver to move on.

Inside the carriage Moran sits beside the Professor, with Porter and Bennett seated opposite the pair.

“I trust that you will remain discreet about what happened here tonight,” Moriarty remarks as they move at a fast trot down the drive.

He has known Porter the longest of all of these men, and while it is Moran he has come to trust the most, he does trust Porter too. Bennett is a little more of an unknown quantity, and Moriarty dislikes that. It was Moran who suggested that he could be useful to them and he does trust Moran's judgement, but still, it is hard to be sure. He is not about to prematurely sacrifice someone who may still be of use to him however, but he must be certain that Bennett will not talk to anyone of this.

“Of course, Professor,” Porter says.

“And you?” Moriarty queries, regarding Bennett steadily in the gloomy interior of the carriage. “I hope you will not be too troubled by what occurred?”

Bennett looks back at him equally steadily. “I ain't gonna blab, sir,” he says. “I've got little kiddies of my own, and if anyone ever 'armed 'em I'd likely do the same as what you've done to that _monster_ back there.”

Moriarty glances at Moran, very briefly, who gives him the slightest nod. It is easy for people to spin out tales, inventing children when it is convenient for them to do so, for whatever purpose, but no mere story, is Bennett's claim; he has three children and dotes on them – Moran knows this to be true.

“Very well,” Moriarty says, which concludes the discussion.

Moran's blood is still up. His foot taps against the floor of the carriage and it is evident that were he not presently confined in this small space he would be pacing like a caged tiger, still seeking an outlet for those tumultuous emotions stirred by confronting Lord Abbott. The Professor can feel him practically vibrating beside him, more so when he places a gloved hand upon Moran's arm briefly.

Bennett, staring out of the window at the passing scenery, pays him no attention, but Porter watches this in silence. He knows something of the intimacy which exists between the Professor and the Colonel and in truth he is glad, that the Professor has found someone to keep him amused in a more private capacity, as well as someone upon whom he is willing to put some of the burden of running his criminal empire. Porter is somewhat concerned by the Colonel's state of mind however. Having been in Moriarty's employment longer than Moran, he feels a certain degree of protectiveness towards the Professor. Moriarty is such a forceful personality though, with such a domineering nature, he seems to perfectly balance out some of the Colonel's excesses and the occasional lapses in his self-control.

Their destination now is one of the Professor's many residences, not often used this one. It is far from luxurious, but Moriarty thinks tonight they may require isolation more than they require luxury, and it is easier for them to travel back to London tomorrow than try to make the journey overnight. He has ensured that the house is well supplied with the necessities – plenty of coal for the fires, food and drink, fresh bed linen and changes of clothing – so that when they do return to London they should be refreshed and have no trace of the night's earlier activities clinging to them.

As they step from the carriage onto the gravel drive, Moran gives the ivy-clad house a cursory glance before striding inside. He has been here only once, and briefly, but he remembers his way around the place well enough.

Behind them the driver sends the horse on again, taking the carriage round the back where there are a couple of stables and a shed to house the carriage for the night.

“Is he all right?” Porter asks Moriarty in a low tone, as Moran walks ahead into the house, tossing his hat onto a coat hook as he goes.

Moriarty glances after the Colonel, not entirely sure about the answer, but he won't admit that even to Porter. “He'll be fine. You may leave us now.”

Striding across the flagstone floor of the hall and into the drawing room, Moran rolls his head from side to side, as if to work out a kink in his neck. He walks almost noiselessly due to a combination of the soft rubber soled boots he has donned for tonight and his manner of walking. He pulls off his gloves and tosses them onto a side table. Moriarty looks at those bared hands, thinking about how easily they took a man's life tonight. He has had those same hands upon him so many times now; had them pinned under his; had them caress his face with infinite tenderness too. Trying to reconcile the image of Moran being tender with the image of Moran the murderer may seem impossible, but it is surprisingly easy. Even when Moran half-turns to regard Moriarty over his shoulder, when his eyes look very dark and his entire being seems imbued with sly malevolence, Moriarty can still easily remember how gentle Moran can be.

Porter closes the door as he exits the room, heading for a different part of the house. He knows better than to intrude when the Professor and the Colonel are like this. Besides, he's hungry. Not quite cut out to be an assassin, Porter is still the kind of man whose appetite is not quelled by the sight of a corpse, so with seeking out his supper on his mind, he leaves Moriarty and Moran to work matters out between them.

Moran has discarded his coat across the back of the sofa. He is rarely this careless usually, but he cares not at all tonight about troubling to hang it up properly instead. He walks towards the hearth where a fire is already burning, having been lit by the person who brought many of the supplies to the house, and stands staring into the flames.

Moriarty shrugs off his own coat and tosses it down beside Moran's, before strolling over to stand behind Moran.

“Does it vex you?” he asks.

“What?” Moran asks, without looking away from the fire.

“What we did tonight?”

Moran laughs, a sound that seems to come from deep within him. “No.” He turns to peer at the Professor. He is a little shorter than Moriarty, leaner too, but in times like this he seems much larger somehow. The firelight throws his shadow back, upwards, onto the wall behind him. “Not that.”

“What then?”

“Things I saw, before. One in particular.”

“In India?”

“Yeah. It reminded me of... that. ”

“ _I've seen your kind before time and time again_.” Moriarty's voice, but they are Moran's words of earlier.

“Yeah,” Moran says again, turning back towards the fire. Taciturn, unwilling to expand further on this.

Moriarty does not push. Instead he puts a hand on Moran's shoulder, and Moran spins around as if the Professor's touch is electrified.

The Professor, looking at him, realises fully how wound up Moran still is – all of his nerves straining, jumpy as a startled cat. If Moriarty had expected the killing of Abbott to be some kind of catharsis for the Colonel, he apparently has made a slight miscalculation somewhere. Moran's violent impulses need an outlet and he has not expended all of his rage, all of his fury in killing Abbott.

Moran tugs off his own tie as if the thing has suddenly become hateful to him, an unpleasant reminder maybe of what might be his fate were anyone else to discover what he did tonight. Or maybe it is the trappings of civilisation that he suddenly finds too constraining and hateful – his tie, his starched shirt collar, his well-cut suit – when civilisation can produce monsters such as Abbott. His jacket follows the tie, thrown aside carelessly, and then his waistcoat.

“I was too fucking late then and all,” he says.

“Too late for what?”

“To save the other children!” Moran snarls, and Moriarty realises, what that look on his face is – it's guilt. He cares nothing about snuffing out Lord Abbott's life; he cares very much however that he did so only after the man had killed other boys.

“You saved Tom Cooper.” Such guilt will never trouble Moriarty; he is not that kind of man. He succeeded in doing what he set out to do – find Master Cooper, ensure his safety, return him to his family, and dispose of the man responsible for his disappearance. There is even the real possibility that he has saved other boys from a grim fate, by getting rid of Abbott. Those already dead... that is not the Professor's doing. It is sad – terribly sad – and he pities them even, but why should he feel _guilt_ over their deaths when he was not the cause of them?

Moran though is not like him in this regard. He already carries a burden upon his shoulders, recollections of others he could not save – soldiers, mostly; _his_ men, but then, there were others too.

“Yeah.” Moran sits down on the sofa and rubs his hand across his face. A few seconds later though and he is on his feet again. “And I don't mean to make it seem like... that ain't important. Course it is. But saving him while the rest of 'em lay dead and buried out in the garden...” Because he saw the direction of the Professor's gaze, standing there in Abbott's house, when he looked out into the gardens, and he knows that this thought occurred to Moriarty too.

“Moran.” Moriarty tries to put his hand on the Colonel's arm, but Moran brushes him aside. “That is not your fault.”

Moran's posture is rigid, absolutely resisting Moriarty, blocking any attempt to draw him close, to comfort him. He doesn't want comfort now; he wants – _needs_ – something else. When he turns and pushes Moriarty back against the wall, when he closes his mouth over the Professor's, it is not the behaviour of a man seeking tenderness, but an act of provocation. That simmering violence within him is still held in check, but barely. The kiss is still rough, his lips meeting Moriarty's with almost bruising force, but Moriarty takes it, meets and matches it. The kiss goes on for perhaps half a minute, before the Professor puts a hand up and twists it in Moran's hair, pulling his head away. He shoves Moran back, so that the Colonel practically sprawls against the sofa, and there he lies, looking up at the Professor, laughing, knowing that Moriarty's behaviour is not a rejection.

“Not here,” Moriarty says. No more need be said, just a slight nod of his head, and Moran slides off the sofa, follows him from the room, up the stairs to the bedroom.

While lacking the greater comforts of their room in the Conduit Street house, there is at least a large bed in here, with clean linen, as well as a chair, a side table with a few necessities standing upon it, and a rail for hanging clothes upon.

Once the door is closed and locked behind them Moran is on him once again, pushing him back against the door, making the key bounce in the lock. He kisses him fiercely, in a way that makes it hard to catch one's breath, makes it hard to think. For a few seconds Moriarty allows it, lets Moran press him back against the painted wood, before he tugs Moran's head back with a hand in his hair again.

“You wish to take charge of me, do you my boy?” he enquires.

Moran laughs again. “No sir.”

Moriarty still grips him tightly by the hair, forcing Moran's head up and back, and Moran watches him steadily, a little breathlessly.

“You think you can dominate me, do you, hmm?” Moriarty asks.

“No sir.” Moran grins at him, still provocative.

Moriarty puts a hand to Moran's chest and pushes him back against the bed. As Moran falls back against it however, he grips the front of the Professor's jacket in his fist, dragging on it hard enough to pull Moriarty off balance, bringing him down onto the bed too. Moran is so quick, so lithe, and within a second or two he is atop the Professor, Moriarty pinned down on his back beneath him, Moran's hands gripping both of his wrists, holding his hands down on the counterpane either side of his head.

Moriarty tilts his head slightly, looking up at the Colonel who crouches over him, his pupils wide in the dimly lit room. The man is a killer, and he does not forget that; does not forget for one second that those hands holding his down are the hands of a murderer. But the Professor remains insouciant beneath the Colonel, as Moran leans over him, Moran's hips straddling his.

“God, you're always so fucking calm,” the Colonel says. And he wonders what it would take to really unnerve the Professor; what would actually get through that veneer of his and leave him truly shaken, truly afraid. Whatever it is, he couldn't do that himself, no matter how tempting it may be from time to time to wipe that smug look off the Professor's face – he could never harm this man.

He has faced down men who wanted him dead, and ferocious tigers; been in the midst of battles, and his nerve has not been shaken; he has been still, calm, and his hand has been steady all the while. But then he has come across men like Abbott – inconsequential people, really, yet who have caused Moran's iron nerve to quaver and frequently his self-control to snap. And yes, he is angry, to some degree, that the Professor is not affected in the same way as he himself is, which is absurd – he knows that – because Moriarty is not the same man as him and does not think in the same way as him and Moran knows and accepts that. But it still troubles him, that Moriarty is so calm about it all now.

He shifts his right hand to the Professor's throat, gripping but not squeezing, and Moriarty looks up at him still, still serene.

“I don't know how you can be... so...”

“Inhuman?” Moriarty smiles.

“That ain't what I was gonna say.” Moran digs his thumb in sharply under Moriarty's jaw, a reminder not to be so presumptuous. “Composed.” He leans over, kisses Moriarty again, pressing their mouths together for a few seconds, before withdrawing slightly. Bowing his head, he remains there, his face perhaps an inch from the Professor's, close enough to share breath. “If I put both my hands around your throat,” he says, not looking at him, closing his eyes. “Tried to choke the life out of you, would you even react then?”

“You would never do that,” Moriarty says simply. “Do you intend to run through all these hypothetical scenarios which we both know will never occur? What if you pulled a knife on me and slit my throat? What if you forced yourself upon me?” Moriarty reaches with his free hand and palms Moran's arousal through his trousers.

Moran opens his eyes again. “Sometimes I want to slap that smirk off your face,” he says.

“I know.” Moriarty gives him precisely that expression which makes Moran wish to behave in such an unbecoming manner, as he unbuttons the Colonel's trousers. When he slips his hand inside Moran closes his eyes again, gasping at the touch. With every second that passes it is becoming more and more apparent that any semblance of control Moran had over the situation has gone; that he has handed it over entirely to the Professor now, which is what he had intended from the first moment he started this.

“Sir,” he says, his voice husky with arousal as he opens his eyes and looks into the Professor's face. “Take me, please.”

“Take you, chick?” Moriarty queries, feigning absolute innocence even as he runs his hand along Moran's shaft.

“Use me, hard, make me unable to forget that I am yours.”

“Is that something that is likely to slip your mind if I do not oblige you?”

“No sir, I just...” He cannot put it into words, his need to be taken roughly, to be made – at least for a little while – to be able to think of nothing but that he belongs to the Professor, in body and soul. He will never forget that he is Moriarty's – his paramour, his plaything, his agent and angel of death, the devil's red right hand – of course, but tonight, especially, there are other things he does need to forget. “Please, Professor.”

Moriarty looks up at him, considering the possibility of saying no; of refusing Moran simply because he can.

“All right,” he says.

Moran straightens up to slide his braces down his shoulders, so that they hang down by his hips, and Moriarty seizes the opportunity to stand up. Standing behind the Colonel, he grips Moran's wrist, pulls it behind his back and twists it at the same time as he pushes Moran, so that the Colonel is bent over the bed, face down, grunting slightly as he lands awkwardly. Moriarty feels Moran's momentary tension, his brief instant of instinctively resisting, and his surrender.

“Still there is so much violence within you, my boy,” the Professor remarks, tugging Moran's trousers down. “You are such an exquisite paradox, Sebastian. Cold-blooded and hot-blooded in equal measure.” He gives Moran's bare arse a light slap before reaching over to catch hold of the bottle of oil on the table. Goodman's Hair Oil, it says on the label, but it will serve Moriarty's intended purpose perfectly well. He undoes his own trousers and takes his own half-hard prick out from his underclothes before he tips a little oil onto his palm and strokes it over his cock, smearing it down from root to tip several times, coaxing himself into a state of greater arousal.

Moran, his cheek pressed against the bed, glances back at him as the Professor adds a little more oil before he guides the head of his prick between Moran's buttocks with one hand. The other he places against the back of Moran's neck, keeping him pinned down under him as he pushes inside him. Moran sucks in a sharp breath, exhaling it through gritted teeth. The penetration is relentless, Moriarty pressing into him slowly but with steady pressure, making Moran keenly aware of every inch. Usually the Professor is far more thorough about preparing Moran, even to the point of tormenting the Colonel with his refusal to proceed more quickly. This time there is a far greater sensation of being stretched, the burning pain of being breached and entered.

Moran's fingers clench into the counterpane. He twists his head back around so that his face is pressed against the bed, smothering his gasps against the fabric. It hurts, not only being entered but Moriarty is now gripping Moran's hips tightly enough to bruise, holding him in place firmly, but it's on the right side of pleasure. He is not the kind of man who wants everything to be all sweetness and flowers every time. A little discomfort, he can tolerate; a little pain meanwhile, sometimes he actively craves that.

Moriarty thrusts into him roughly and aggressively, moving one hand back to the nape of Moran's neck to pin him, while the weight of most of his body traps Moran's body beneath his. _Use me, hard_ , Moran had pleaded, _make me unable to forget that I am yours,_ and Moriarty does. Every deep thrust into that beautifully warm, slick channel is another reminder of his possession of Moran. When he changes his angle slightly, aiming to press against that particularly sweet spot inside Moran, the Colonel's muffled cry is the sweetest music.

Moran feels as if he can hardly breathe, pinned face down, the Professor's hand against the back of his skull, and that itself is intoxicating. He need think of nothing else, only the weight of the Professor's body on top of him; the burn of being stretched and filled; the exquisite pleasure as the Professor's thrusts stimulate him internally, and the slight coarseness of the fabric of the Professor's trousers against his bare buttocks; the firmness of the hand splayed against the back of his neck; the friction of his own prick against the counterpane. In this moment he is at peace, despite the seeming violence of Moriarty's thrusts inside him; despite the forceful manner in which he holds Moran's head down.

“ _Mine_ ,” Moriarty says, his voice a fierce whisper as he presses his face close against the back of Moran's neck. When he nips hard at Moran's earlobe Moran gasps and comes almost at once, spilling onto the bedclothes beneath him, a strangled, ragged moan coming out of him into the damp fabric beneath his mouth. Moriarty feels the tensing of Moran's body around and beneath him, followed by the slackening of Moran's muscles as he finally relaxes. The Professor pushes on regardless, getting closer to his own climax but not quite there. He presses his face close against the nape of Moran's neck and he bites at Moran's shoulder, through his shirt, feeling the Colonel's body buck underneath his in response, and finally he too finishes, spending deep inside Moran, his moan of pleasure as he reaches completion muffled against Moran's shirt.

Feeling very limp, Moriarty collapses atop Moran, further holding him down to the bed. Under him the Colonel twists his face sideways in order to draw breath properly. His shoulder throbs a little where the Professor bit down on him as he came. The skin is not broken however, only temporarily marked, and the way that little point of pain seems to pulsate, in rhythm with his pulse, his heartbeat, feels very profound somehow.

His arse hurts and all. Actually, he aches all over now, in a way he often doesn't after sex, but it's good, it's satisfying somehow, and he could quite contentedly lie here for hours with Moriarty on top of him. The Professor's weight is soothing, like a heavy blanket.

He wonders if he's bleeding – thinks by rights he should be, after being fucked so violently – but doesn't care enough to check. Even the Professor, who dislikes the mess left behind after sex, does not seem inclined towards getting up yet. Moriarty only shifts slightly, to move a little further onto the bed, pulling Moran with him so that he spoons around him.

“James,” Moran says at last. “Do you... think badly of me, for caring?”

“Why would I do that, pigeon?” Moriarty enquires.

“Maybe you think it's weakness, to care.”

“It is a matter of context, surely. In certain circumstances, yes, caring would not be advantageous. In other situations however...” If Moran did not care for the Professor so then he likely would not be so loyal, Moriarty knows that. But even aside from that, that Moran cares – fiercely - about certain things, about certain people, it is not a weakness; it has never seriously compromised Moran's ability to work for Moriarty, and it has set limits on his behaviour, the sort of limits many other men of similar temperaments appear to be lacking. “I think that those who seem to care about nothing and nobody are probably more liability than asset,” Moriarty remarks after thinking this through for a few seconds. People, even those employed by the Professor, need to have certain limits. They must be sometimes flexible when it comes to matters of morality, maybe, but Moriarty could never have men in his employment he knows to be incapable of controlling themselves; those who view others from such a distance that they might easily indiscriminately commit rape or murder – men of Abbott's kind, in fact. Such men are not merely distasteful to the Professor but also ultimately always prove impossible even for him to exert real control over. “But Sebastian, my dove, _you_ are an asset to me. That you care about those children, that is not weakness.”

Moriarty has seen Moran talking to children like that, the boys and sometimes girls too who run errands for them or sometimes will follow someone of interest to them. It's clear to the Professor that the children not only respect but like the Colonel. Moran, who can be rather reserved and withdrawn around many adults, seems far more comfortable around the children, but Moriarty knows for sure that there is nothing improper about his interest in them. He pays them for the tasks they carry out and he shows an interest in them. In fact more than once Moran has gone to deal personally with the parent of one or other of those children, the few who have any surviving parents at least, when their child has shown up with a black eye or bruises. Moriarty cannot actually tell most of the children apart – to him they are all grubby and poorly attired, despite Moran's best efforts with them, and even some of the girls are indistinguishable from the boys, and of course they all tend to be far more reticent on the occasions when they have met the Professor, even though Moriarty has never been unkind to them. But he is certain Moran knows all of their names, where they live, their relations, their pets, and of course, Moran found out from them when other children began to go missing, because they trust him enough to confide in him about that. That sort of trust, Moriarty thinks, is invaluable.

Moran smiles and snuggles closer into the Professor's embrace. His fury has passed, Moriarty can tell; it has dissipated like a storm-cloud blowing away. The stage he is at now is quieter and far more introspective, not calm precisely and still not immune to tormenting himself further with some misplaced sense of guilt, but far less prone to self-destruction and better able now to start thinking about his next task for the Professor.

“We had better move,” Moriarty says at last.

Moran groans in response. “I don't think I'll be able to move for a week now. I'm gonna be feeling this for a month.”

“You are perfectly all right. Besides, you asked for it.” Moriarty slaps Moran's backside lightly, playfully.

Moran glances back, still expecting to see blood, but there is none. He remembers suddenly Abbott's blood on his hands; how he thought, dimly, that maybe a normal man would be repulsed by the feel of it, the stink of it too, but he had regarded it with utter indifference. Blood doesn't bother Moran much, although he'd still rather not be the one bleeding. Looking down then he notices the spot of blood on his shirt cuff – Abbott's, not his own. That doesn't matter; anything incriminating will be burned before they return home.

“Get yourself cleaned up, and the bed too,” Moriarty instructs as he stands up.

“Right sir,” Moran says.

-

Downstairs Moriarty finds Porter in the kitchen, seated at the scrubbed wooden table and eating what would appear to be a plate of beef stew. A large pot of the same substance stands bubbling on the stove, it having been brought in earlier by a local woman and left for them to heat up.

“The Colonel all right?” Porter asks, using a large hunk of bread to mop up some of the gravy from the edge of the plate.

“Fine,” Moriarty answers. “Bennett gone?”

“Yes sir. Got washed and changed and 'ad a bite to eat then took the messages, like you said.”

“Do _you_ trust him, Daniel?” Moriarty asks, leaning against the table as he stands over the shorter man.

Porter looks up at him, his hand holding his piece of bread stopping a couple of inches from his mouth. “Yes sir, I do.”

"Very good.”

Porter relaxes. “Want some stew?” he asks, after eating another bite of bread. “It's very tasty.” He stands up, scraping back his chair.

“Yes, all right, please.” Moriarty pulls out a chair and sits down.

“I'll put some out for the Colonel too shall I?”

Moriarty nods.

Porter busies himself ladling stew out onto two slightly chipped but clean plates and cutting and buttering several more thick slices of bread. He tactfully pretends not to notice the Colonel's somewhat dishevelled state when Moran enters the kitchen. The Professor looks almost impeccable, but Moran's hair is still mussed up and he has not bothered to put his waistcoat or jacket back on. He is also walking rather stiffly, somewhat like a man who has spent too long astride a horse perhaps, and he definitely seems to wince slightly as he sits down at the table opposite the Professor.

“'Ere you are, Colonel, you get something nice and hot inside you.” Porter places the steaming plate of stew down in front of him, and Moran would swear that the shorter man winks at him as he does so.

Moriarty, looking down at his own stew, appears to smirk slightly.

Porter seems about to move away, but he pauses and claps Moran on the shoulder. Moran glances at him strangely, wondering about the man's familiarity. Porter, even though he has known the Professor far longer, has certainly become intimate with Moran in a way he could never be with Moriarty, who keeps everyone save for Moran at a distance. Moran is still not sure he can bring himself to call Porter a friend, but the man is growing on him.

“Colonel, you know... the Cooper boy'll be all right,” Porter tells him. “Likely be back with his family come morning, and that's mostly down to you. Well both of you, of course.” He darts a glance towards the Professor, not wishing to sound as if he is maligning Moriarty's role in tonight's events.

“No, no.” Moriarty waves a hand airily. “The greater portion of the credit must go to Moran.”

Moran looks down at his stew, his face seeming to flush slightly. He toys with his fork, idly pushing a chunk of potato around the plate. He has rarely felt less like eating.

“Moran, don't,” Moriarty murmurs, and Moran's gaze darts up to meet the Professor's, gazing at him across the table. Their eyes meet for several seconds before Moran looks away again.

If Porter notices what passes between the two, which he almost certainly does, he chooses not to draw attention to it. He only pours wine for the two of them.

“You won't drink with us?” Moriarty enquires, noting there are only two glasses.

“Not really a wine man, me.” Porter sets the wine bottle down on the table beside Moriarty's place and opens a bottle of ale for himself.

There is a strange camaraderie here in the warm kitchen between these three men, all of them privy to this great secret. That is part of the trouble though, for Moran – them sitting here eating and drinking as if nothing very much has happened, when those poor children still lie there in the cold ground, all but forgotten about. Of course he doesn't wish his part in Abbott's demise to be public knowledge but nor does he wish Abbott's own horrific secrets to simply die with him. But he knows that a man such as Abbott, with money and power and privilege, would never have been brought to true justice by the law; his secrets would never have been smeared across the papers were things left to the police – Moran has seen such things happen time and time again.

His hand clenches around the handle of his fork.

“Moran,” Moriarty says again.

Moran throws his fork down onto the plate with a clatter and makes to rise, pushing back his chair.

“Sit down,” Moriarty says. His voice is quiet, but there is a hardness to its tone that makes even Moran hesitate. “Please,” the Professor says, more gently.

Moran narrows his eyes but pulls his chair back in again.

“I know you are angry still, about what Abbott did; about those other boys, but I promise you, Sebastian, they will not be forgotten. People will know.”

“And how's that?” Moran enquires. “A man like that, rich, with his 'good breeding', they'll let him get away with murder. They were only _gutter rats_ after all,” he sneers, mimicking and mocking the dead lord's words of earlier.

“People will know because information is already being sent off even now – to various newspaper men; to certain other individuals. To start with, tip-offs to various people will suggest that they take a closer look at certain portions of Abbott's garden.”

Moran takes only a second to understand this. “That's why Bennett's gone?”

“Yes.”

Something changes, subtly but definitely, in Moran's posture. Abruptly some of the tension has gone out of him, as he realises, no, the Professor will not let Abbott get away with what he did; will not allow him to keep his secrets even in death. “I weren't sure you trusted him,” Moran says after a moment.

“Since you and Porter here both deem him reliable, I trust him enough, and he has too much to lose himself should he let me down. Now...” Moriarty stretches across the table and picks up Moran's fork. He offers it to the Colonel, holding it out until Moran, with a sigh, finally accepts it. “Please stop playing with your food and just eat it. It is really very good.” Beneath the table he presses his foot against Moran's leg, and Moran glances up at him again, surprised by the touch. Moriarty smiles at him, with great affection.

Moran, that fierce, feral tiger of a man; that avenging angel of death, smiles back, and obediently gets on with eating his supper.


End file.
